


Wolf at the Door

by greenapricot



Category: Lewis (TV)
Genre: Alternate Universe, First Kiss, Hurt/Comfort, Lewis Fright Fest 2018, M/M, Magical Realism, Werewolves, casefic
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-10-31
Updated: 2018-10-31
Packaged: 2019-08-11 03:19:57
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 12,054
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16467665
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/greenapricot/pseuds/greenapricot
Summary: A DI investigating the murder of a prominent lycan historian ought to be paying more attention to the phases of the moon. But there’s nothing like a case that starts bright and early on a Saturday morning, and hasn’t yielded a single solid lead three days in, to mess with one’s ability to remember what day it is.





	Wolf at the Door

**Author's Note:**

> Written for [Lewis Fright Fest 2018](https://lewis-challenge.dreamwidth.org/175884.html). My prompt was Werewolves of London by Warren Zevon (though beyond the fact that there are werewolves, this fic has nothing to do with the song). Takes place after s6.
> 
> A million thanks to Jack for the superquick beta and werewolf expertise. All remaining mistakes are my own.

Robbie could have called a taxi, he could have called the nick to get a uniform to give him a lift. He could have rung Hathaway. Instead, when his car gives up the ghost—the bloody check engine light that blinked on at the end of last week does mean something after all—he gets out and walks. Well, he swears at it and kicks it, then starts walking. 

He’s only just made it back to Oxford, after driving out to Brighthampton for the second time in three days, to have yet another long and fruitless talk with the victim’s sister. He’s tired. He wants to go home, have a beer, microwave some dinner, and go to bed. He doesn’t want to wait around to be fetched, especially at this time of night. Without a car, the towpath along the canal is the quickest route home.

A DI investigating the murder of a prominent lycan historian ought to be paying more attention to the phases of the moon. But there’s nothing like a case that starts bright and early on a Saturday morning, and hasn’t yielded a single solid lead three days in, to mess with one’s ability to remember what day it is. When the clouds part, bathing the world in the unearthly glow of the full moon, Robbie is almost home. 

Not that it matters, none of the supposed sightings of untreated wolves in the city over the past couple of full moons have been proved. It’s nothing but the work of overactive imaginations fueled by exceptionally rainy early autumn weather. People start to get irrational when the darkness sets in, and with the ever-present low hanging clouds, it’s set in earlier this year than most. 

These rumours are no different to the usual paranoid flights of fancy that crop up between the autumnal equinox and Samhain, as soon as the first gateways of the year are sighted. It’s almost as if the rumours are being fed by the thinning veil between this world and the next. Maybe they are. But the fact that they started earlier this year doesn’t make them any truer. Full moon and possible untreated wolves or not, there’s nothing for it but to keep going. If Robbie turns back for the road now he’s only going to be in for an even longer walk. 

The dark shapes in the trees along the towpath are nothing but shadows cast in sharp relief by the sudden bright moonlight. They weren’t there before because the moon was obscured by clouds, not because they have moved. All the same, cutting across the park away from the edge of the canal may not be a terrible idea; leave himself more than one means of escape. If there were anything that needed escaping from. Which there isn’t. So much time spent reading through their victim’s research into times before effective lycanthropy treatment was developed is not helping Robbie’s ability to remain calm.

He quickens his pace, distancing himself from the trees along the canal, but the shape that’s detached itself from the shadows is still there. Getting closer. Faster. A black blur hurtling over the grass toward him. Robbie is running before he even realises it, toward the road on the other side of the park, the fenced-in playground, the bridge that leads toward home. 

The world flashes light then dark, dark then light, as he passes the last row of trees. The shape is still there at the edge of his peripheral vision. Fast. Too fast. A snarl, a growl, and it’s on top of him. He hits the ground hard, flat on his back and gasping for breath as teeth snap in his face and he desperately tries to find purchase on thick black fur. To hold the wolf off, to shift its weight, to get out from under it, anything. Anything to keep the snarling and teeth from his throat for a moment longer. 

Then there is a new deeper growl and a flash of white slams into the wolf on top of him. A snarl, a yelp, and there’s no weight on his chest. No wolf at his throat. Robbie sits up, breath coming in harsh gasps, hand to his throat. No detectable break in the skin. He breathes a sigh of relief. 

The two wolves are locked together on the grass, a growling blur of light and dark fur. The dark wolf on top, then light, then dark again; a whirlwind of ferocious energy until they suddenly stop. The lighter wolf’s teeth at the darker one’s throat, a low growl, a snap of teeth, a whimper, and the dark wolf streaks off the way it came, back toward the shadows along the canal. 

The light wolf watches until the dark one is out of sight then turns to Robbie. The wolf is big, no, more tall than big, lanky. Robbie stands with effort—being slammed into the ground hasn’t done his back any favours—and faces the wolf. It did save his life, but he was wrong about the shadows in the trees not moving. If there was one untreated wolf out for blood there could be two. As if it has read Robbie’s thoughts the wolf extends its right foreleg, turning it to expose the inside of the elbow, if you call it an elbow on a wolf. 

The band of silver runes glints in the moonlight, shimmering both above and below the fur all the way around its leg. Robbie knows what it means, of course, the runes allow lycans to live normal lives, but he’s never seen them in action before. He hadn’t realised something so practical would be so beautiful. The band is iridescent where the light catches it, shifting subtly from silver to almost gold and back as the runes react with the moonlight. 

“Thank you,” Robbie says. The wolf tilts its head to the side as if sizing him up, then points its nose in the direction of Robbie’s flat. Can’t be anything but a coincidence; the runes help the bearer overcome the baser lycan urges, but they don’t impart psychic powers. The wolf can’t know where he lives.

“Suppose I ought to get going before that other one comes back.” The wolf nods in agreement. Robbie takes a few steps toward home then stops, turning back to the wolf.

“If there’s anything I can do for you in the future. DI Robbie Lewis.” He pulls a card out of his jacket, walking back toward the wolf, holding out the card. The wolf raises an eyebrow at him.

“Right. You’ve nowhere to put it do you?” Robbie slides the card back into his pocket. “Well, I’m at Cowley Station. Have the desk sergeant give me a ring if you’re, ah… yeah— Thanks again.” 

The wolf bends its head forward in an approximation of a bow and Robbie turns for home. When he glances behind him as he’s crossing the bridge, the wolf is following along about ten feet behind, almost as if it’s escorting him. It seems to have developed a limp.

“There’s no need to trouble yourself,” Robbie says. “I’ll be fine. It’s less than a half mile.” The wolf shrugs, he wasn’t aware they could do that. In the glow of the streetlight, he can see a dark patch of blood on the wolf’s hind leg. “You’ve hurt yourself, you should get that looked to.” The wolf shrugs again but when Robbie starts walking it continues to follow. 

When Robbie turns into his front garden, past the spot where his traitorous car should be parked, the wolf stops, sitting between the bins and the low wall that separates garden from pavement. 

“Cheers,” Robbie says, as he opens the front door. “But there’s no need to—” he gestures up and down the street. The wolf gives a soft woof and a nod but shows no signs of leaving. “Suit yourself.” 

The wolf is still there when Robbie shuts the curtains before bed.

* * *

Hathaway arrives at the office the next morning with his coat buttoned up to his chin, two takeaway coffees, and a slight limp. He deposits Robbie’s cup on his desk with a mumbled, “Good morning, sir,” hangs his coat on the back of the door, and dives straight back into the stacks of handwritten notebooks and papers that make up their victim, Jasper Windell’s, research without once looking Robbie in the eye.

He looks exhausted, not an entirely unusual occurrence, incurable insomniac that he says he is. Robbie’s never had any cause to doubt that until now. But where is his head? Not on straight if it’s only occurring to him now that he ought to report last night’s attack. He must have been in shock. He’d gone straight to bed after the wolf escorted him home, not even bothering with dinner. Even if it was an isolated incident an untreated wolf in Oxford is a problem. But if that other wolf was James and James hasn’t even told him… 

More likely than not he’s letting the season get to him. But all the same. Robbie pulls up a lunar calendar on his computer, piecing together full moon dates, and his own recollections of the days Hathaway’d come in looking like hell. Some of the full moons coincide with sergeant training seminars, which would tend to point to James not being a werewolf. Unless those seminars weren’t seminars. If they weren’t, leaving aside the larger implications, it looks a whole lot like a pattern, with a few errant days that point to James being both an insomniac and a werewolf. A werewolf who saved his life last night, then stood guard over his flat while he slept, and is apparently going to pretend it never happened. So, typical Hathaway. 

James’ movements are stiff as he shuffles stacks of their victim’s research papers around on his desk. Not surprising considering the fight he was in last night. He pulls a battered notebook out from the bottom of a pile and rubs at the inside of his right elbow as he flips the notebook open in front of him. 

“I could use another coffee,” Robbie announces after double checking the full moon dates. Even if he is a werewolf, Hathaway’s still a caffeine addict. He follows Robbie out the door. 

James is halfway through ordering two takeaway coffees as usual, when Robbie steps in front of him, adds two croissants to the order and says they’re eating in. Robbie gets a worried look for that, but James takes the croissants and follows him to a table in a quiet corner of the cafe.

“Were you going to tell me?” Robbie asks as soon as they’re both seated. No point beating around the bush. 

James shrugs and wraps both hands around his mug. “You got there anyway.”

“You’re a werewolf.”

“I believe the polite term is lycan, sir.”

“Right,” Robbie says and takes a sip of his coffee. “Have you had that leg looked at?”

James tilts head much the same way he did as a wolf. Much the same way he does any time he’s trying to hold back a sarcastic reply to something Robbie’s said. He’s suddenly hit with how obvious it is in retrospect, that the wolf that saved his life is his sergeant. 

“It’s not like I can be turned again,” James says. “Besides, lycans heal faster than humans.” 

“Are they also immune to infection?”

“No,” James looks back and forth across the room behind them, then surreptitiously lifts the bottom of his trouser leg. Above his sock, there is a red bite mark, edged with yellow and purple bruises. It looks days old though, not hours. “I’ll be fine. I’ve had worse.” 

Robbie furrows his brow at that but lets it go. “You saved my life.”

James looks up at him, an unreadable look on his face. “Just returning the favour.”

Robbie is about to protest that it’s not the same, that that was years ago and case-related, but it is. It’s exactly the same. James risked his life to save Robbie’s, like Robbie risked his own to pull James out of the fire all those years ago. And where does that leave them? One hell of an awkward conversation if nothing else. 

James’ shoulders are tense, he hasn’t taken off his coat or even unbuttoned it. Clearly, he would prefer Robbie to drop the subject, but Robbie’s just discovered his sergeant is a werewolf. Lycan. After six years how could he have missed that? Unless this is a recent development. But surely Robbie would have noticed that as well.

“How long have you been…?”

“The one year anniversary of my first change is coming up.” James smiles as if he’s trying to make a joke of it. The smile doesn’t come close to hitting the mark.

Robbie thinks back to the now questionable family emergency James had about a year ago. The only mention of family he’s made in their six years together, save admitting that they had lived at Crevcoure when he was a child. Then there was that day not long after; James sitting across from him at a pub table, looking more dejected than Robbie’s seen him, complaining about the lingering scent of dry rot on his clothes and blaming a bout of existential flu for his mood. Existential lycan flu, Robbie would wager, and the wolf’s heightened sense of smell. No wonder he’d looked so despondent at Robbie’s assertion that finding himself a partner would set him right.

“You got bit?”

“It’s a misconception that lycanthropy is transmitted only through bites. It’s more commonly a hereditary condition, usually manifesting during puberty. Though if it doesn’t manifest then it can also be brought on by close proximity to liminal gateways.”

“So you didn’t get bit.” 

“No. I was in the wrong place at the wrong time.” James bows his head, poking at his croissant, he looks ashamed.

“If it’s hereditary, there’s nothing you could have done.”

James’ head snaps up. “Of course there is,” he bites out. “I should have known there was a gateway there. I should have stayed well away.” James takes a vicious bite of his croissant and glares out the window. “I was so careful for so many years. It’s incredibly rare for lycanthropy to manifest in someone’s thirties. I thought it had skipped me, but I should have known better. I’d seen the alert for a gateway in the area, I knew Gateway Monitoring hadn’t been out there to mark and tag it. If I’d waited… I’d always been able to sense them before and steer clear, but this one… I stumbled right into it. I had to spend the night out in the woods. The first transformation happens at dusk regardless of moon phase. It was too late in the day…” James trails off, bitterness settling into melancholy. 

“A whole year and you’ve been dealing with this all on your own.”

James shrugs. “It’s the lycan’s lot.”

“The runes, though. Someone had to—”

James idly rubs at the inside of his elbow. “I got them as soon as I’d recovered from the first change. Wolfsbane to render bites benign and enough silver to temper the wolf, but not enough to inhibit the ability to change at will or cause any real pain.”

Robbie frowns. “There’s some pain then?” 

James shrugs. “No more than the change itself. The runes fight against the wolf, the wolf fights against the human. The wolf inevitably wins. They do make it possible to resist the full moon change if you’re otherwise healthy but it’s not the best idea. You pay for it later.”

The tone of his voice says he speaks from experience. “And other times?”

James shrugs again and takes a sip of coffee. 

“James, if there’s anything I can do…” 

“There’s nothing… I’m fine, really.” He has a skittish look about him, closing in on himself. The last thing Robbie wants is for James to regret telling him all this. 

“Sorry about the thing with the card last night,” Robbie says.

James lets out a surprised laugh and gives him a genuine smile, ducking his head. “In the park, you talked to me like I was human.”

“Well, you are.”

James shakes his head. “Not technically, no. Even now. The initial transformation makes fundamental changes to the DNA. The runes only give the bearer control during future changes, the damage can never be undone.”

“You seem human enough to me.”

“Thanks,” James says, but his eyes are sad.

“How did you—? Last night… What were you doing there?”

James gives him a small embarrassed smile. “I was passing by if you can believe it. Caught your scent and then Shadow’s scent, so I followed.”

“Shadow?”

“That’s what he calls himself. He’s a Wolf Purist. No runes, living off the land as a wolf more than as a human. They tend to stay on the reserve in Wytham Wood. I’ve spoken to Jones in Supernatural & Vice. Shadow has no memory of coming into Oxford or getting home. Something must have really spooked him for him to attack you like that, but I don’t think you were being targeted specifically.”

“That seemed likely?”

“I’d wondered…”

“Is that not usual for a full moon, not remembering?”

James shakes his head. “The first couple of changes maybe, it is disorientating, but not for someone like Shadow who’s been lycan their whole life. He may be a bit of an arse but he mostly just wants to be left alone. They all do. That’s why they live on the reserve. With the protections, it means they can live fully lycan and not have to worry about humans stumbling across them. There’s no logical reason for any of them to come into Oxford, especially on a full moon. Jones suspects Shadow was drugged.”

“You think this has something to do with the unconfirmed sightings over the past few months?”

“I do.” He glances at Robbie for a moment. “You know those training seminars for sergeants Innocent’s been sending me on?”

“Innocent knows?”

“I was going to resign after I had my run-in with the gateway. She talked me out of it. She needed someone to go undercover with the Purists. Lycan officers are hard to come by, so we sorted out a system that would give me days off for the full moon that you wouldn’t question, and I go undercover when she needs me.”

Robbie bites back a comment about James hiding things from him. They’ve had this argument before and by the hunch of his shoulders, the last thing James needs is another reason to castigate himself. 

“Isn’t that dangerous?” Robbie asks instead.

Hathaway shrugs. “The Purist aren’t a bad lot, only misunderstood.” Robbie is about to question that further when James’ phone rings from inside his coat. He looks relieved as he unbuttons the top buttons and fishes it out.

“Hathaway. Yes, thank you. We’ll be over shortly.” He turns to Robbie. “Lady Cecile Cosgrave’s assistant says she’s returned from Paris.”

* * *

Lady Cecile Cosgrave, entrepreneur, lecturer at Balliol College, and heir to Cosgrave Hall once her ailing mother passes, is the last of Jasper Windell’s friends and acquaintances that they haven’t spoken with. She has that old money look about her that always sets Robbie’s teeth on edge, and starts talking down to them immediately, until Hathaway asks, in his best public school accent, where she was on the night in question between 8:00 and 10:00 pm.

“I was having drinks with Petra,” she says as if they’re supposed to know who Petra is. “Kane,” she adds to Robbie’s unimpressed look. “We have drinks every Friday unless one of us in on the continent.” 

“Your assistant tells us you’ve been away since Friday evening,” James says.

“I like to pop over to Paris for the weekend when I can.”

“A weekend that ends on a Tuesday?” Robbie asks. He catches James’ barely restrained eye-roll out of the corner of his eye.

Lady Cosgrave gives Robbie an exasperated look. “An extended weekend, then.”

“So, you met Petra around half seven. When did you leave Oxford?”

“Around half nine, directly from the pub. Jules drove me to the airport.”

“Jules?”

She gives him a scathing look. “My driver.”

“Did you see Jasper Windell at all on Friday?” Robbie asks.

“No. I lecture on Wednesdays.” 

“Last Wednesday afternoon you were seen arguing with Professor Windell,” Hathaway adds.

“Yes, well. He always did enjoy a bit of a debate.”

“What did you debate about?” 

“Last week? Those Wolf Purists I suppose. I have no problem with them, of course, but the location of their reserve is quite inconvenient. The number of times I’ve had a funding partner for one of my events pull out once they discovered what the eastern side of the estate abuts. I’ve made them a very generous offer of a much larger property in Wales, but they’ve so far refused. I thought Windell might have some insight, but he believed they had a right to stay there, on land they were granted by the crown but never purchased.”

“Cosgrave Hall was granted by the crown in 1586,” Hathaway mutters low enough for only Robbie to hear. Then to Lady Cosgrave, “This wasn’t just an intellectual debate. You were trying to push them off their land.”

“Not at all. It may benefit me if they moved, but I believe they would benefit from having a larger piece of land farther from civilisation. My offer still stands should they choose to accept it. I hope that they do. Do you think the Purists had something to do with Jasper’s death?”

“We couldn’t possibly comment on an open investigation, ma’am,” Hathaway says in his best faux conciliatory tone.

“Well,” she says, looking affronted. “You can hardly think I had anything to do with it.”

Petra Kane’s account of Friday evening is much the same as Lady Cosgrave’s. They had drinks as they always do, from around half seven until Jules came to fetch Lady Cosgrave, then went their separate ways. 

“Yeah, they argued,” Kane says, with a snort of a laugh when asked about the argument Professor Windell and Lady Cosgrave had on Wednesday. “They hardly did anything else. I’m honestly not sure why they were still friends when they never agreed on anything, but that’s how they were. It was the same when they were up together. If they hadn’t been arguing, then I would have been worried something was amiss. I’d always thought it was a strange way to maintain a twenty-year friendship.” 

Lady Cosgrave’s alibi stands up to the questioning of the pub staff, her driver, and the passenger manifest for her flight to Paris. Which leaves them, almost a week into the investigation, with no viable suspect or motive and a mountain of handwritten documents to comb through in hope of a clue. 

“There’s got to be something in here,” James says when they get back to their office and the towering stacks of Windell’s research that encircle the edges of the room like an invading army. “I thought we had her.” Robbie refrains from mentioning that Lady Cosgrave’s feelings about the Purists may have clouded James’ judgement. There’s no point opening that can of worms. 

“It had to be a historian who abhors computers,” Robbie sighs. He’ll be the first to admit he’s not the best with them himself, but it’s an exceptional level of commitment to being a luddite, Windell taking all his notes and writing out all his research by hand. 

Once they get back into it, Hathaway at least, seems to gather some enjoyment from reading the history. But then that might not have anything to do with him being lycan, he always did go in for that sort of thing. They spend the rest of the day combing through notebook after notebook and paper after paper, but they’ve got nothing useful to show for it by going home time.

* * *

The wolf is back that night. James as a wolf is back, sitting in the same spot by the bins when Robbie parks his newly repaired car.

“Thought you said you didn’t think Shadow was a threat?” Robbie says. Wolf James does his wolf shrug. Robbie can’t suppress a chuckle at how very much himself the lad is in canine form.

“What’s all this, then?” Wolf James shrugs again. Or just James, Robbie supposes, as strange as it is to think of the wolf standing in front of him as James Hathaway. This is James trying to show him something about himself, something Robbie suspects only Jean Innocent may have known until yesterday. Best not to look a gift wolf in the mouth.

“Right,” Robbie says, more to himself than James and heads inside. James matches his stride up the walk as naturally on four legs as he always has on two. 

“You eaten?” Robbie asks once he’s shed his coat and emptied his pockets of keys and wallet. “There’s some mince in the freezer. I could make burgers? Or would you prefer it raw?” Robbie sighs and sits down on the arm of the sofa. 

Wolf James seems much bigger standing in his living room than he had out in the garden. He is as long-limbed and slim as human James. His fur, which had looked pure white under last night’s full moon, has a subtle sandy-blond tint to it in the light of the living room, his back and hind legs very slightly darker than his head and forelegs. 

“What are you doing here like this, lad? It’s— This is— I know you’re you in there but this is damn strange.”

James cocks his head to the side and looks him right in the eye. It’s a look Robbie has gotten from James countless times, usually accompanied by a sarky comment. James doesn’t make any further effort to communicate, though, watching Robbie with eyes the same changeable blue-grey shade they always have been. 

After a minute James takes a couple of tentative steps closer, sits down with his hind leg brushing Robbie’s calf, and sort of leans over until most of his weight is resting against Robbie’s leg. 

Robbie touches the top of James’ head with the tips of his fingers. James tilts his head up for more contact and Robbie lets his fingers sink into the thicker fur at the back of James’ neck. It’s incredibly soft, and Robbie doesn’t realise that he’s started petting him, carding his fingers through his fur, rubbing his thumb over the back of James’ head and between his ears, until James makes a pleased whine. Robbie stills for a moment, his hand resting on the back of James’ neck and James tilts his head back into Robbie’s palm again, a clear request for him to continue. 

They stay like that long enough that Robbie’s leg starts to go numb, perched on the arm of the sofa as he is, with James’ not insubstantial wolf weight pressed against him. He shifts his leg, unintentionally dislodging James from his lean. 

James stands up and shakes himself, takes two steps toward the door and gives Robbie a pointed look.

“Had enough of me, then?” 

James makes a little huff which almost sounds like a laugh. Robbie takes it to mean yes and gets up to open the door for him.

* * *

The next day James looks more relaxed than he has in weeks. He even gives Robbie a very small genuine smile when he hands over the day’s coffee offering. He says nothing about his wolfly visit to Robbie’s flat, so Robbie keeps mum as well, but he finds it even more difficult than usual to concentrate on Windell’s inscrutable notes with his mind wandering back to everything James revealed yesterday.

It probably ought to have come as more of a shock to discover that his sergeant is lycan, but the only part that really bothers him is that James hadn’t felt he could tell Robbie. That and the mysterious undercover missions. He feels protective of the lad, despite the fact that James can change into a wolf at will and he was the one who saved Robbie’s life. It’s unlikely that Innocent is sending him into situations that are particularly dangerous alone, but if James is the only one able to assess the situation, she may not be making her decisions with accurate information. He wouldn’t put it past James to do something that would put himself in unnecessary danger for what he perceives to be the greater good. 

Just before lunch, James turns up a note in one of Windell’s many notebooks that alludes to the intentions of a ‘Vic’ to stop by and borrow a book the night he was murdered. Vic according to the Balliol College porter is Victoria Reed, one of the students they spoke with on the first day of the investigation. She’d said she was out with her mates during the time of death window, but a search of Windell’s rooms fails to turn up the book in question.

From Balliol College, they head to the cafe where a number of Windell’s former students work. It’s Victoria’s day off, but her mates change their tune about the time she joined them for drinks when questioned again. Now they say she joined them half an hour later than she’d previously claimed.

After a misty start, the day has turned into a pleasantly bright Autumn day of the sort that has been quite rare this year, all impossibly blue sky and coloured leaves glowing in the sunlight. A fine day to stop on a bench and eat the sandwiches Robbie grabbed from the cafe on their way out. 

Robbie tosses James his sandwich, which he catches one-handed, and sits down on the bench. James settles in next to him, gazing into the middle distance, watching the wind catch yellow leaves from the trees and send them swirling through the air. He looks content for once. It’s unlikely that Robbie will get a better opportunity to ask the question that’s been bothering him all morning.

“This undercover work you’ve been doing,” Robbie says as he unwraps his sandwich. “Will you let me know next time? Before you go?”

James narrows his eyes at him and begins unwrapping his own sandwich. “It won’t interfere with our working together. Innocent always makes sure we’re off rota when I need to go undercover.”

“That’s not why I’m asking.”

He stops with the sandwich halfway to his mouth. “You’re worried about me?”

“Of course I am, man. As much as I don’t agree with Lady Cosgrave that the Purists should be shipped off to the hinterlands it can’t be safe for you to being spending time with them on the full moon.”

James sighs. “It’s nothing to concern yourself with, the worst that ever happens is a few bites and scratches. I’m lycan as well, don’t forget.”

“I’m not likely too,” Robbie says. He’s thinking of last night, wolf James leaning against his leg, his fingers buried in his fur. By the slight pinkish tinge that crosses James’ cheeks, he is too. “But you’ve got runes. They don’t take exception to that?”

James shakes his head. “I’m not the only lycan with runes who spends time on the reserve. And they’re not like that. It’s just— I don’t think a human can fully understand. There’s—” James puts down his half-eaten sandwich and lights a cigarette, exhaling a puff of smoke into the breeze before continuing. 

“There’s a sort of freedom to being a wolf, not being lycan but to be in wolf form, even with the discomfort of changing. To be so steady on your feet, to run for hours without tiring. It feels closer to the earth, like being part of something larger, something primal. It’s not how I want to live but I can see how a lycan who has no ties to the human world might choose that life.” James’ tone has gone wistful, he glances at Robbie then takes another drag of his cigarette. “Besides, even lycans without runes don’t tend to be aggressive unless threatened, even on a full moon. The reserve may attract more than the usual number of lycan criminals looking for somewhere to lie low, but the majority of them only want to be left in peace.”

Robbie is tempted to ask what the point is of having an undercover officer in their midst if the Purists only want to be left alone. But Innocent will have her reasons and the shadow in James’ eyes when he glances Robbie’s way tells him not to push it.

“Okay,” Robbie says. “But let me know next time, yeah?”

James searches Robbie’s face, then nods. “If it matters that much to you, I will. But you won’t be able to contact me.”

“I do know how undercover works.” 

“I’ll tell Innocent to keep you in the loop, sir,” James says, stubbing out his cigarette on the side of the bench and picking up his sandwich, still looking incredulous but also a mite pleased.

* * *

Victoria Reed’s flat is shabby and crammed with almost as many books as Windell’s rooms at Balliol College. She removes stacks of books from two chairs and sits opposite them on the sofa, more books to her left and right.

“When we spoke before you said you were with your mates between 8:00 pm and 10:00 pm last Saturday,” Robbie says. “But now they’ve told us you didn’t arrive until 8:30.”

Victoria looks shifty. “I— I must have lost track of the time.” 

“Where were you between 8:00 and 8:30, then?” Robbie asks. Victoria says nothing, glancing behind them toward the door as if she’s considering doing a runner. “We could have this discussion down at the station if you’d prefer.”

“No, I can’t— I—” Victoria is sitting on the edge of the sofa now, looking far more agitated than a person with nothing to hide ought to. 

“Victoria,” Hathaway says. “It’s all right.” He stands, shrugging off his coat and jacket and dropping them both on the chair behind him, then begins unbuttoning the cuff of his right sleeve, rolling it up above his elbow, turning his arm into the light. The silver band of runes encircling his arm isn’t as bright in the dim light of Victoria’s flat as it had been in the moonlight, but the intricate patterns across his skin are the same. “You can trust me.” 

“Oh,” Victoria says. She looks from James’ arm to his face, then to Robbie. Robbie nods. “I didn’t know there were lycan police.”

“I’m just a police officer who happens to be lycan,” James says as if it’s something he reveals to potential suspects on a regular basis. “Can you tell me where you were between 8:00 and 8:30?”

Victoria sighs, but looks much calmer than she had moments before. “Professor Windell had a book I need for my dissertation. He’d been using it for his research too so I arranged to pick it up from him before I met everyone down the pub. I went to his rooms just before eight but I— I could smell the blood before I even opened the door. I knew it had to be something bad… and when I saw him lying there. The book was on the shelf next to him and I really needed it… I changed, so there wouldn’t be any fingerprints, and I took it. But I swear he was already dead. I panicked. I grabbed the book and left. I didn’t mention it before because I was afraid the book would be evidence and I’d have to give it up. I came back and left it here then went straight to the pub. I didn’t think anyone had even noticed I was late.”

“Did you see anyone else when you went to Windell’s rooms? Anything out of the ordinary?”

Victoria shakes her head. “No, no one. Nothing.”

“May I see the book?”

“Yeah, sure.” Victoria stands and pulls a leatherbound volume from under a pile of papers on her desk. “Do you need to take it?”

James holds the book gently, flipping through the pages. “No, I don’t think we will. As long as you keep it here and make it available to us if we do need it.”

“Of course,” she says with a bright smile as James hands the book back to her. “Thank you.”

“You’re welcome,” James says, rolling his sleeve down and picking up his coat and jacket. “Thank you for your help.” Robbie follows James out the door. 

“If Windell was already dead by eight—” James starts, once they’re back on the street, buttoning his coat as he walks toward the car.

“That throws Graham Martin’s alibi into question,” Robbie finishes. 

“Martin could have made it from The Lamb and Flag to Balliol College to kill Windell and back before 8:30,” James says as he slides into the driver’s seat.

“Looks like it’s time to pay Martin another visit.” 

James nods, starts the engine and pulls out into traffic.

“How did you know she was lycan?” Robbie asks after they’ve been driving for a few minutes.

James glances at Robbie, his face going a bit pink. “I could smell her.”

“Couldn’t she smell you, then?”

James shrugs. “Maybe. But would you let on you were lycan to an unknown police officer if you didn’t have to?” He’s got a point there.

* * *

Graham Martin, who had been up for the same grant as Windell, a grant which Windell received, is at a conference in Cardiff and won’t be returning until late that night. So, they stop round his house first thing the next morning, before Hathaway’s had enough coffee to look anything less than surly. When faced with an accusation of murder Martin admits that he hadn’t been drinking by himself in the back of the Lamb and Flag from the time he left work until his mates arrived. He’d been in a motel in Abingdon with one Karen Ross and arrived at the pub just before 8:30.

Nothing but your run of the mill cheating husband who didn’t want to let on where he’d been lest his wife find out. Robbie likes to think that they’ve done her a good turn, confronting him while she was in the room. Men like Martin never do stop unless they’re caught. 

But that leaves them, once again, back where they started. 

They spend the rest of the day chest deep in Windell’s research. Except for Hathaway reading out the occasional tidbit that he finds intriguing, they find nothing to pique their interest. By the end of the day, they are no closer to finding Windell’s killer than they were at the beginning. It feels almost as if the case is moving backwards, the stacks of research marked for a second look growing ever taller than the stack of exhausted possibilities.

It’s remarkable how tiring a day spent reading through handwritten research can be. Robbie is dozing on the sofa that evening when he’s roused by a scratching noise from the direction of the kitchen. He mutes the telly and listens. The scratching comes again. Whatever it is, it’s much too large to be a mouse. Robbie pushes himself off the sofa to investigate. When he rounds the corner into the kitchen he can make out a white wolf face through the door to the back garden. 

“What time do you call this?” Robbie asks, opening the door. James looks back out into the garden then behind Robbie into the living room. “Only me. You were expecting someone else?” 

James shakes his head and Robbie steps back to let him in. James heads for the sofa then hesitates, stopping to bite at the pad of his foot, not unlike the way he bites his thumbnail when nervous. 

“Go on, it’ll be more comfortable than you leaning against my leg until it comes over pins and needles.” 

James freezes for a moment as if he didn’t want to be reminded of two nights ago. Or, no… he’s feeling guilty. This is the closest Robbie’s seen to James asking for something he wants and if this is what he wants, to sit in Robbie’s flat with him while he’s in wolf form, it may be odd, but Robbie has no problem with it.

“Don’t stand on ceremony.” Robbie steps past James and sits down on the sofa again. James hops up beside him with an elegance that seems incongruous for such a large, gangly legged animal, all long limbs and watchful eyes. But then that’s not much different to James at any other time, is it?

Robbie settles back in, flipping through the channels until he finds something that looks vaguely interesting. James curls himself into a ball at Robbie’s side, like he’s trying to make himself as small as possible, trying not to touch Robbie. He doesn’t look particularly comfortable. 

Robbie puts down the remote and rests his hand on the back of James’ neck. James stiffens at first, then relaxes and uncurls a bit, pushing his head into Robbie’s touch. Robbie sinks his fingers into the soft fur and rubs his neck and ears. James uncurls a little more with each stroke of his hand, resting his head on Robbie’s thigh and stretching out his neck so Robbie can rub his chin. Then stretching out even more until he’s sprawled at Robbie’s side, one leg dangling off the edge of the sofa, looking utterly content. 

James is asleep long before the end of the programme and Robbie finds he can hardly remember it once it’s over. The only thing he can seem to focus on is how calm James is, the tiny huffs of breath of his wolf snores. It seems a shame to wake him. After all, he has spent plenty of nights on Robbie’s sofa in the past. With all that fur he won’t even need a blanket. Robbie slides his leg out from under James’ head, giving the soft fur one more caress, and takes himself off to bed. 

In the morning the sofa is empty. Robbie takes a moment to wonder if James changed in his living room to let himself out, or if a wolf with a human brain can open doors despite the lack of opposable thumbs.

* * *

They fall into a routine, a complement to Friday evening pints and semi-regular nights of takeaway on Robbie’s sofa. More evenings than not, as he’s finishing his supper, Robbie finds a wolf at his door. A wolf who trots right in, nudges Robbie’s hand with his nose in greeting, and takes up his usual spot on the sofa, falling asleep sprawled by Robbie’s side with his head in Robbie’s lap. Without even realising it or intending to Robbie is spending almost every evening with James, whether in human or wolf form.

If Robbie stays on the sofa longer on nights James is there than he would if he were alone, stroking his fur and listening to him breathe. If he dozes off himself more often than not, only to wake sometime in the wee hours and move reluctantly away from James’ wolf warmth to take his aching back off to bed. If he does these things, there is no one to notice save the wolf asleep on his sofa. And the sofa is always empty by morning.

During the day the investigation inches forward; they make slow progress with Windell’s research, some of it requiring translation. They turn up another person of interest, only to discover that they also had nothing to do with Windell’s death, and then another to the same end. Robbie starts to doubt that the key to Windell’s murder even lies in his research, but they have exhausted every other possibility, so they keep on. Neither one of them likes the idea of this becoming an unsolved case. 

By the end of the second week of false starts, Innocent begins assigning them other cases, and combing through Windell’s research becomes something they fit in between everything else. They investigate a spate of burglaries that turn out to be the teenage children of the victims taking turns getting back at their parents, they assist Peterson with one of his stings, they determine that the death of a graduate student that appeared to be suicide is. On that night, wolf James is already waiting by Robbie’s back door when he arrives home. 

They probably ought to talk about all the evenings they’re spending together, but neither one of them has ever been much for that sort of thing. How would Robbie start that conversation anyway? And to what end? _I’ve noticed that you seem to enjoy sleeping with your head in my lap while I run my hands through your fur. I happen to enjoy it too._ No. There’s no reason they can’t carry on as they have been. They’re not hurting anyone, and the change in James’ mood since he first started coming around as a wolf is unmistakably positive; he looks well rested, less restless, and seems to be smoking less. Robbie would hate to disturb their equilibrium by calling attention to it or do anything that might cause a relapse of James’ existential flu.

Besides, Robbie has come to look forward to having wolf James curled up warm by his side, taking up more space on the sofa as a wolf than he ever does as a human. There is an intimacy to it that he hadn’t realised he’d been missing quite so acutely until he had it again. 

So, life carries on as usual. Usual, which now means combing through Windell’s research in their often fleeting spare moments, the stacks of notebooks and boxes of loose paper moving around the office as Hathaway sorts and resorts them, trying one angle then another; and the fact that Robbie’s sergeant sleeps on his sofa in wolf form more nights than not. 

James never makes more than vague allusions to the time he spends at Robbie’s, but he lets slip little glimpses into life as a lycan, hints of what it feels like to be a wolf, to change, facts about the runes, bits of lycan lore, almost as if it’s a thank you. Robbie is grateful for every snippet.

* * *

A month, well, twenty-six days since the night the wolf that is his sergeant saved his life, James is hunched over one of Windell’s notebooks, turning it this way and that, concentrating on a particularly illegible bit of notes in the margins of the other notes. Robbie watches him scrutinise the page as he puts the papers he was going over in order and prepares to go home. James has been working later and later each night as the full moon approaches, though there hasn’t been a night this week that he hasn’t appeared at Robbie’s door.

“It’s Friday,” Robbie says.

“I’m aware,” James replies without looking up, turning the notebook to the left and hunching further over it. 

“Don’t stay too late.”

James does look up then, giving Robbie a small enigmatic smile. “I won’t.”

The welcome scratch at the kitchen door never comes, though. Robbie gets a text instead. 

_Last minute seminar. Sorry I couldn’t give more warning. Back Tuesday._

Seminar? 

Right. The undercover work. Despite all James has let on about being lycan over the past month, he hasn’t once mentioned anything about his undercover work. Robbie texts James back, then rings him when he gets no reply. Already out of contact, then. He rings Innocent.

“He’s fine, Robbie,” Innocent says before he’s even asked the question. “I am aware that you asked to be informed ahead of time, but there was no ahead of time with this. It seems that Windell had suspicions that someone has been abducting Purists and taking them off the reserve during the full moon against their will. He believed this was the reason for the uptick in wolf sightings in Oxford. Windell’s notes were quite cryptic, it was a reference to a fourteenth-century lycan poet that tipped James off. James thinks that whoever’s been trying to discredit the Purists may be the same person who murdered Windell. He’ll be at the reserve until after the full moon on Monday night.”

“Who is it, then?”

“He didn’t say. He was already on his way to the reserve when he called me. I’ll have officers nearby.”

“Damnit,” Robbie mutters, then remembering who is on the on the other end of the phone. “Sorry, ma’am.” 

“I’m not pleased either, but James has done this many times before. He knows the Purists well. He is the best placed to get to the bottom of this and the only officer I have who has the Purists’ trust.”

Robbie wants to argue, to insist there must be some other way, but none of the arguments he has against James doing what he has already done are in any way rational. Robbie sighs. “Yes, ma’am.”

“You’ll be off rota until James is back. Try to have a good weekend.”

* * *

Saturday dawns cold and dark, low clouds threatening rain that never comes, the day dark as twilight from the time he gets up to the time the sun sets. Robbie goes through his usual weekend-off-work routine of minor household tasks; laundry, dealing with the pile of post that’s collected during the week, the necessary shopping. He keeps himself busy.

It’s rare enough for Robbie to see James during the day on a Saturday if they’re not working, and yet the fact that he can’t now, that he knows he won’t be getting any texts about something James saw at the Ashmolean or a bit of trivia he finds amusing, makes him long for those little points of contact. He misses the lad even though they spent all day together in the office yesterday. He’s worried about him. Bloody ridiculous. 

When evening comes and he finds himself sitting on his sofa waiting for the scratch at his kitchen door that he knows full well isn’t coming, he gets down the whisky. A drink or two to calm his thoughts. He wakes up alone on the sofa at two in the morning. The whisky was a bad idea, at least the bottle wasn’t full to start with. 

Dark clouds continue to hang over the city on Sunday, with the addition of a steady, soaking rain. In the absence of anything else to distract him, Robbie embarks on a long overdue deep clean of his flat, even scrubbing out the inside of the oven which likely hasn’t been done since the previous tenant. By the time he’s done, his arms are sore and his flat is sparkling but there’s still a solid ball of worry settled in his gut. He hadn’t even known where James was any of the other times he’d gone undercover and he always came back fine, without a scratch on him. Or without a scratch that hadn’t healed by the time he appeared back in the office. 

Robbie calls Lyn, but he can’t talk about what’s truly bothering him. The conversation is stilted and awkward in a way conversations with Lyn haven’t been since she was a teenager. He apologises saying he’s had a long week, and assures her there’s no need to worry about him. He goes for a walk in the rain until he’s soaked through, takes a bath, tries to watch the telly, the day passes agonisingly slowly. 

Monday, without another case to distract him, Robbie tries to piece together the clues that James found on Friday, the notebook he’d been scrutinising is still open across his desk as if he’d left in a hurry. Robbie finds nothing in the scribbles among scribbles, some of which aren’t even in English, that points to who James suspects the murderer could be. There’s nothing for it but to finish up the paperwork from their recently closed burglary case.

That evening, as Robbie tries to concentrate on a movie that he is actually interested in with no great success, it occurs to him that this is the longest he’s gone without seeing James, whether as a wolf or a human, since the last full moon. 

And that’s the root of the problem, he’s gotten so used to James’ presence next to him on the sofa, the warmth of him, the easy affection that has started to bleed over into their workdays. James stands closer now than he did before, shoulders not only brushing Robbie’s but almost leaning on him some days, and flashes Robbie small, private smiles as they go about their day. Robbie has caught himself touching James more often; brushing his hand along James’ shoulder as he walks past his desk, fingers lingering when James passes him a folder, their legs settling firmly against each other under a pub table while they eat lunch. The thought of not having that, like this night, sitting alone on his sofa, feels like a great loss, a return to an emptiness he doesn’t want to face. 

He’s contemplating getting down the whisky again, despite the fact he’s already had a couple of beers and has work tomorrow, when there’s a thump from the garden. A thump, not a scratch at the door. James won’t be back until tomorrow. But the fact that he knows James wouldn’t be there doesn’t keep Robbie from being disappointed when he doesn’t see a wolf face through the glass door. 

Robbie opens the door and squints through still the pouring rain into the dark all the same. It’s the sort of wind and driving rain that threatens to knock the last of the leaves off the trees. Maybe the wind has blown one of the garden chairs over. It hasn’t, but there is an unfamiliar amorphous shape in the far corner by the garden wall. The shape moves and he can make out ears and a tail; a wolf with an irregular spotted pattern to its fur.

“Oi!” Robbie shouts into the wind. All he gets in response is a whimper, barely audible over the rain. There’s a full moon above the clouds, approaching an unknown wolf is not the best idea. The wolf whimpers again, turning around to face him. It’s James, huddled against the wall like he fell there, soaking wet, his fur all over with dark splotches.

Robbie hurries across the wet garden in his stocking feet and kneels by James’ side, gently placing his hand on his back. The dark splotches are mud.

“James, lad.” James gives Robbie a baleful look, standing with effort, unable to put his full weight on his right foreleg. “Let’s get you inside,” Robbie says, his hand coming away muddy as he helps James hobble across the garden.

In the light of the kitchen, Robbie takes stock of James’ injuries as best he can, running his hands over James’ back and legs, checking for anything serious or unseen. There are patches of fur missing along his back, bloody claw marks across the band of runes on his right foreleg and dried blood matted into the fur beneath it. James flinches and whimpers when Robbie reaches his ribs, tender, likely bruised.

“Shadow again?” Robbie asks, still crouched on the floor next to James who is now leaning against his leg.

James shakes his head, sending drops of water and mud across the kitchen tile and Robbie’s shirt. 

“Another wolf?”

James shakes his head again. 

“Not a wolf?”

James nods. The scratches along his back and across the runes on his leg look an awful lot like claw marks, though.

“Is there some other kind of… were-animal?” James cocks his head to the side a clear, _don’t be ridiculous_. “A human?”

James nods once at that, then looks pointedly toward the stack of Windell’s notebooks on Robbie’s kitchen table. 

“To do with the case?” Robbie sighs. “I wish you could change back and tell me.” James raises an eyebrow without moving his head. “Yes, I know the runes make it possible to resist the change on the full moon but not reverse it. I have been paying attention. I’ll ring Innocent.”

James lifts his paw and touches Robbie’s knee, smearing his trousers with more mud.

“No, eh?” 

James shakes his head.

“Because there’s something you don’t want her to know or because she already knows?”

James lets out a soft huff of a bark. Robbie’s not entirely sure which statement he’s agreeing with. 

“I suppose it doesn’t matter much while you’re still a wolf, does it? You need a wash, though.” 

James nods then looks down at the mess of water and mud around them both.

“Be right back,” Robbie says. He grabs a towel from the hall cupboard and half wraps James in it, sopping up the worst of the water and mud, then drops it on the floor for James to walk over and wipe his feet. 

“Right,” Robbie says, stepping back. “You know where everything is.” 

James tilts his head to the side as if Robbie has proposed something impossible, but he— Oh. 

“Yeah, working the taps with your teeth… Okay, I can— Are you all right with me—?” Robbie gestures feebly toward the bathroom. James nods then limps out of the room, tracking only a small amount of muddy water down the hallway. 

It’s not easy getting a wolf with only three good legs into the bath, but once settled James relaxes under the spray and Robbie’s ministrations. He uses most of a bottle of shampoo scrubbing the mud out of James’ fur, working his way bit by bit along his body, lathering, scrubbing, rinsing, taking extra care around the patches of missing fur and his tender ribs. James leans into Robbie’s touch as he rinses out the last of the shampoo.

Once the water flowing down the drain runs clean Robbie sits back. James is no longer a splotchy mess, but he’s no less bedraggled looking, standing soaking wet in Robbie’s bath shivering a bit and looking more like a drowned rat than a wolf.

“You look like you could do with a proper bath,” Robbie says. “Warm you up.” James gives a small yip of agreement. Robbie turns on the taps. 

This is the point where he probably ought to leave James in peace, but somehow he doesn’t want to let the lad out of his sight. He busies himself cleaning up the muddy footprints and water on the floor. Once the tub is full Robbie turns off the taps and James lies down, sinking into the warm water up to his neck, rolling his head, stretching his neck, then submerging his entire body and slopping water over the side.

When he pops up again he gives a rapid shake of his head, spraying Robbie with water. James blinks at him through the water droplets on his eyelashes, blond even as a wolf, and lets out a snuffling snort. James is laughing at him. Robbie looks down at himself; his shirt is sopping wet, wetter than the water James just sprayed him with, and spotted with mud. By the way James is looking at the top of his head, his hair is in a state as well. 

“You’re quite a picture yourself,” Robbie says. “Great big wolf lounging in the bathtub.”

James dips his nose under the water, splashing water over the side in Robbie’s direction. 

“Right. I know when I’m not wanted,” Robbie says with a chuckle and heads for the door. There’s a splash behind him and Robbie turns to see James with one leg over the edge of the bath and a look of alarm on his face as his hind legs slide out from under him. “They really didn’t make these with wolves in mind, did they?” Robbie says, stepping forward to hold James around the shoulders, keeping his weight off his injured leg until he’s got all four feet on the bathmat. Well, three and a half, the way he’s still holding his right foreleg off the floor. 

James looks at the floor, where his sodden fur is dripping all over, then the towel hanging on the hook, then at Robbie, and gives his head a quick shake. “Okay,” Robbie says, taking a step back into the doorway. James shakes his whole body this time, spraying water across the entire bathroom. 

When James is done, Robbie grabs the towel and dries him off the rest of the way, James leaning almost his entire weight against Robbie as he rubs the towel over his back. Robbie realises the lean isn’t so much a desire for contact, as it so often is, but unsteadiness on his feet. The lad has been in a fight and possibly walked all the way from Wytham Wood afterwards.

“You’re exhausted, aren’t you?” 

James lets out a soft reluctant wuff, nodding his head where it’s leaning on Robbie’s shoulder while Robbie dries his belly.

“I’m a bit knackered myself,” Robbie confesses, dropping the towel on the floor. “Let’s go to bed.” 

He doesn’t realise what he’s said until he’s already out the bathroom door. He turns to find James standing in the hallway behind him with his head tilted in question. He may not have meant to say it out loud, but Robbie’s not about to leave James out in the living room by himself, state he’s in. 

“Come on.” Robbie gestures down the hall. “Bedroom’s warmer, anyway.”

James tilts his head in the other direction, still questioning. 

“There’s plenty of room,” Robbie says. 

James continues to stare at him a moment then shakes his head, as if to say, _if you insist_ , and follows Robbie down the hall.

In the bedroom James gingerly hops up on the right side of the bed, smoothing the duvet out with his paw. Robbie grabs pyjamas from the drawer and heads back to the bathroom to have a shower and change. 

When he returns James is curled in a ball on top of the duvet, nearly asleep. He lifts his head slightly and opens one eye as Robbie crawls into bed, then settles back down, shifting closer to Robbie. Robbie rests a hand on the back of James’ neck, stroking the soft fur as James’ breath evens out into sleep.

* * *

James is in his bed, not James as a wolf but James, human James. A very naked human James, curled next to him on top of the duvet, his bum pressed up against Robbie’s bent knees with only the bunched up duvet between them, Robbie’s outstretched arm lying inches from James’ bare shoulder.

He is relaxed in sleep in a way Robbie has only seen him as a wolf, beautiful in the dim morning light; the curve of the nape of his neck where his hair is shortest, the jut of his shoulder blades, the play of muscles as he shifts slightly, curling his legs closer to his chest, the dip of his spine at his lower back. All enticing planes of smooth skin. Not all lycans are covered in hair, apparently. Robbie wonders if James was quite so fit before he ran into that gateway or if the toned muscles of his back and shoulders are an artefact of a werewolf’s superior strength. Though the rowing likely doesn’t hurt.

By the light filtering through the curtains, it could be early morning or it could be yet another overcast day. Either way, Robbie ought to be getting up and off to work. But instead of making any move in that direction he finds himself just lying there watching James breathe, cataloguing the already mostly healed scratches across his back, the contrast between the silver of the rune tattoo and James’ skin.

Robbie reaches across the scant inches between them and rests his hand on the back of James’ head, running his fingers through the short hair. It feels entirely different to running his fingers through wolf fur and yet much the same; comforting, intimate. James shifts at the contact, letting out a pleased murmur, and turns into Robbie’s touch. He lets his fingers trail down James’ neck and across his collarbone as he rolls over. 

James blinks at him, sleepy and a tad wary at first then gives Robbie a small, contented smile. 

“Hello,” he says, his voice barely more than a whisper. 

“Hello,” Robbie echoes, his hand still resting on James’ bare skin. They stay like that for long moments, Robbie’s hand rising and falling with James’ breath. “James,” he says finally as if it’s the only word in the world he could possibly say.

“Robbie,” James answers; tentative, seeking permission. 

Robbie nods his head against the pillow. “Aye.”

Then James is reaching for him, cupping Robbie’s cheek in chilly fingers before sliding his hand under the duvet and down Robbie’s chest in a mirror of Robbie’s own position. 

“Aren’t you cold?” Robbie asks.

“A little,” James admits. 

Robbie tugs at the duvet and James slides off of it as Robbie pulls it up, covering him with it. Under the duvet James moves closer to Robbie, reaching for him again, gazing into his eyes. 

“You’re okay with this,” James says. “Me in your bed.”

“More than okay, I’d say.”

James smiles big and bright, then searches Robbie’s face as if looking for any hint that his previous statement isn’t true. “I thought you might not— It’s not quite the same as on the sofa…”

“Because you’re not a wolf, you mean?” James nods. “I’d say it’s a sight better.” 

He runs his hand over the back of James’ head again, stopping to trace the shell of his ear, then down along his neck and across his collarbone. It feels right, being with James like this, a logical progression of all the time they’ve been spending together. Robbie repeats the motion and James moves closer still, reminding him that James is tantalisingly naked under the covers. Robbie waits to be shocked by the realisation, to feel uncomfortable with a naked man in his bed. But it’s not any naked man, it’s James. 

James who is wrapping his arms around Robbie, nudging aside his shirt collar, pressing his face into the hollow of Robbie’s throat and inhaling. Smelling him, pressing close in a way not at all dissimilar to when wolf James nuzzles against his thigh. Except that wolf nuzzles never stirred anything in his nether regions. 

Robbie runs his hands across James’ shoulders, then down, exploring the planes of his back before skating over his ribs. James flinches and lets out a soft, _ah_. Robbie pulls back.

“Did I hurt you?”

“A bit,” James says, voice muffled against Robbie’s neck. Robbie puts some space between them. The look on James’ face has gone from content to disappointed. “Sorry,” he says.

“I think I should be apologising to you,” Robbie replies, lifting up the duvet. “Let me see.”

James lifts his arm reluctantly, exposing a collecting of nasty looking bruises across his stomach and ribs. Bruises that had previously been hidden by fur. They look, as the bite on his leg had a month ago and the scrapes on his back do now, like they are days old, not hours. Lycan healing powers at work, but by the colour and number of them, it’s still going to be a good few days before he’s fully healed.

“That looks suspiciously like a boot,” Robbie says, gently touching the largest of the bruises.

“Told you it wasn’t the Purists.”

“You going to tell me who it was?”

“Lady Cecile Cosgrave,” James says, pulling the duvet back over himself. “Windell suspected someone was abducting Purists on the full moon and bringing them to Oxford. There were coded notes in his research going back three months. He was paranoid, thought he was being watched. Which got me thinking that it must have been someone he saw regularly if he was worried they might find out. I finally put everything together after you left on Friday. The key was a passage of medieval lycan poetry. Lady Cosgrave was using the abductions to try to prove the Purists were dangerous so her petition to have the reserve cleared would gain public support. Grab a couple of lycans before the change, drug them so they lose all sense of who and where they are, and drop them off in Oxford.”

“And the rest? Those look like claw marks.”

“Also Lady Cosgrave. She had these metal spikes attached to gauntlets, they were meant to look like wolf claws. A last resort. If she couldn’t induce any of the Purists to attack a human she’d fake an attack herself. I think she thought if she could cut through the runes I’d lose my control and she could set me loose in the streets as well. When that didn’t work she settled for kicking me and holding me down with the claws when I tried to get away.”

“James.”

“It’s fine. I’m fine.” James holds out his arm showing Robbie the inside of his elbow. Like the rest, the scratches there are well on their way to healed, the line of runes tattooed across his skin unbroken. “The backup team arrived before she could do any lasting damage.” 

“Why go out to the reserve if you thought it was her, then? Why not bring her in?”

“There was no evidence, only Windell’s plausible speculation. And I doubt anyone without a working knowledge of medieval lycan poetry would have picked up on it. She would have kept right on doing what she was doing. Now we’ve got her on abduction, transporting untreated lycans into populated areas, and assaulting a police officer, on top of murder.”

“Her alibi was solid.”

“Well, conspiracy to murder. I think we’ll find that her driver’s alibi isn’t so solid after all. She’s very loyal.”

“I wish you’d’ve told me.”

James shakes his head against the pillow, toying with the buttons on Robbie’s pyjama shirt. “You would have tried to stop me. Innocent would have too.”

“Aye.”

“I had to do it. The Purist life isn’t one I’d choose but it’s what they want. If she’d succeeded in whipping up enough public outrage against them it wouldn’t have mattered if her petition went through. There would’ve been a mob of bigots to take over for her. She almost succeeded in bringing four untreated lycans into Oxford this time, on a full moon days before Samhain… You know how that would have ended.” James meets Robbie’s eyes. Here they are lying in bed discussing a case as if this is something they do, and Robbie realises how very much he wants every case to end this way, minus James’ injuries. 

“Ah, lad,” Robbie says, sliding his hand up James’ arm. “I’m sorry you had to go through all that.” 

“I really am fine,” James says, “It’s not the same, getting injured as a wolf. It’s more removed, almost like it happens in a dream. It’s not a dream I’m eager to revisit but it’s not as bad as it could be. The wolf is more resilient.” 

“If you say so,” Robbie says, still sceptical. 

“I do. There’s no need to worry about me.”

That may be true, the lad does seem fine, despite everything, but lack of need seems to be no barrier to him worrying. James slides his hand up Robbie’s chest and cups Robbie’s cheek in his hand again, planting a soft kiss on his lips. 

“Thank you,” he says, smiling at Robbie with undisguised affection. 

“For what?”

A flush crosses James’ cheeks. “Accepting me… even before the whole lycan thing. For this.” He draws his thumb along Robbie’s jaw. “Everything, really.” 

He rests his forehead against Robbie’s and they lie there just breathing the same air for long, comfortable minutes. Until Robbie finds himself barely able to resist the urge to kiss him again. And why is he resisting, with James in his bed like this, looking at him like that? Robbie leans forward and captures James’ mouth. 

The kiss is languid, all-consuming, enough to make a man forget everything but this, so Robbie does.

_____


End file.
